LIBRARY OF CONGRESS.? 

(^.mi. |wigltt| r o. $ 



UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 



THE 



Annihilation of the Wicked 

SCRIPTURALLY CONSIDERED. 



Tbe quarrel of the world with Christianity comes to its issue upon the 
doctrine of future retribution. — Isaac Tayloe. 



NEW YORK: 
CARLTOX & LAXAHAK 

SAX FRANCISCO: E. THOMAS. 
CINCINNATI: HITCHCOCK & WALDEN. 
.1872. 




By Rev. W. McDONALD. 




9 



Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1872, by 
CARLTON & LANAHAN, 
in the Office of the Librarian of Congress at Washington. 



The Library 
of Congress 



WASHINGTON 



PEEFA CE. 



"Has man a dual :n t atuke?" During a 
long and thorough discussion of the foregoing 
question by, and in the presence of, a large 
body of Clergymen, the authors of this little 
volume presented their views upon the subject 
of the annihilation of the wicked, etc. At 
the close of the discussion they were unani- 
mously requested, by vote, to publish the same 
in some convenient form. With such changes 
as were deemed necessary to adapt them to 
popular use, they are now offered to the public. 
The authors do not claim to have furnished an 
exhaustive treatise on the subject, but a con- 
cise statement of the scriptural and philosoph- 



4 



PBEFACE. 



ical arguments by which this baneful error is 
overthrown ; — a treatise which may be quickly 
read and easily comprehended by all. 

May this little volume lead many, as the dis- 
cussion did a leading minister of the annihila- 
tion faith, to renounce the error and embrace 
the truth as it is in the word of God. 



THE 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 



,0 understand the peculiar doctrines of a 



i reformer, we should understand the senti- 
ments of the people among whom he labors. 

Jesus came, as he himself declares, (Matt, 
xv, 13,) to root up every plant which his heav- 
enly Father had not planted. In doing this, he 
came in direct conflict with the Jews on many 
questions of faith and practice; exposing their 
false interpretations of Scripture, and showing 
that in many things they made void the word 
of God by their traditions. But upon the 
question of the existence of souls or spirits, in 
distinction from material organization, there ap- 
pears to be no conflict of sentiment except with 
the Sadducees, who were the materialists of the 
time. The Jews, among whom Christ labored. 




6 ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 



believed in the separate existence of spirits or 
souls, with endless punishment for the wicked, 
and happiness of like duration for the righteous. 
We cannot understand the Old Testament rec- 
ord without admitting that the Hebrews held 
and taught the doctrine of the immortality of 
the soul. 

1. The fact that a soul or spirit might exist 
separate from the body crops out every-where 
throughout the Old Testament, indicating the 
belief of the Hebrews. 

What other idea could the people receive 
from Elijah's prayer? "O Lord my God, let 
this child's soul come into him again ; and the 
Lord heard the voice of Elijah ; and the soul 
of the child came into him again, [or into the 
midst of him again,] and he revived." 

What other meaning could have been in- 
ferred from the language of Job ? " But his flesh 
upon him shall have pain, and his soul within 
him shall mourn." 

2. The Jewish belief in necromancy is proof 
of their belief in the separate existence of souls. 



A^IEILATIOIn OF THE "WICKED. 



7 



They believed that a necromancer was one who 
had power to summon np and consult the dead. 
The law concerning this practice is in Deut. 
xviii, 10, 11 : " There shall not be found among 
you any one that maketh his son or his daughter 
to pass through the fire, or that useth divination, 
or an observer of times, or an enchanter, or a 
witch, or a charmer, or a con suiter with familiar 
spirits, or a wizard, or a necromancer" 

i: Necromancers," says Campbell, " are those 
who consult the dead/' Dr. Jahn says : u Necro- 
mancers pretended that they were able by their 
incantations to summon back departed spirits 
from their abodes." Dr. Stackhouse says : 
"Necromancy is the art of raising up the dead 
in order to pry into future events.*' Josephus 
says : " Demons are the spirits of wicked men, 
who enter into living men and destroy them, 
unless they are so happy as to meet with speedy 
relief." It is admitted by our best writers that 
this was the belief of the Jews. 

We have a practical illustration of this belief 
in the case of Saul, who consulted the witch 



8 ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 

of Endor. Saul went to this woman with the 
demand, " Bring me him up whom I shall name 
unto thee." She did not deny her power to do 
it, but plead that her life was in danger from 
Saul's prohibition. On Saul's assuring her 
that she should not be harmed, she inquired, 
" Whom shall I bring up unto thee ? " He re- 
plied, u Bring me up Samuel." Such a request 
would never have been made had Saul been a 
materialist. He believed she could call up the 
spirits of the dead. And in this he but reflected 
the belief of the Jewish nation. 

3. The Jews held the same belief in the time 
of Christ. 

There were at that time three sects among 
the Jews, namely, the Pharisees, the Sadducees, 
and the Essenes. The Essenes are not named in 
the New Testament, for the reason, as it is sup- 
posed, that they were an order of the Pharisees, 
and hence included under that general name. 

Of the Pharisees, Josephus says : " They be- 
lieved that souls have an immortal vigor in 
them, and that under the earth there will be 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 



9 



rewards and punishments according as they 
have lived virtuously or viciously in this life." — 
Ant.) book xviii, ch. 1, sec. 3. This refers to the 
intermediate state, or the state of the dead be- 
tween death and the resurrection. 

" They " (the Pharisees) " say that all souls 
are indestructible," etc. War, ii, 14. 

Speaking of the Sadducees, Josephus says : 
"The doctrine of the Sadducees is this: that 
souls die with the bodies." Again : " They 
take away the belief in immortality, and the 
punishments and rewards of hades." 

Of the Essenes, Josephus says : " They teach 
the immortality of souls.*' " They teach that 
bodies are corruptible, but that the souls are 
immortal and continue forever." — Ant. xviii, 5 ; 
Wars, ii, 18, 11. Of the soul, Josephus says : 
" The soul is ever immortal." 

Here is a clear statement of the belief of the 
Jews in the time of Christ, for the Pharisees em- 
braced the mass of the people. Josephus says, 
the doctrine of the Sadducees " is received but 
by few," who, when they became magistrates, 



10 ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 

" addict themselves to the notions of the Phari- 
sees, because the multitudes would not other- 
wise hear them." — Ant. %/ xviii, 1, 4. 

The testimony of Philo, the Jew, is of value, 
as indicating the Jewish belief in immortality 
at that time. Philo was born in Alexandria, 
Egypt, a few years only before Christ. He 
says: "Man stands upon the border line of a 
mortal and immortal nature, participant of each, 
as was needful, and that he was made at the 
same time mortal and immortal — mortal, as to 
his body ; immortal, as to his mind? " Death 
of the man is the separation of the soul from 
the body ; but death of the soul is the destruc- 
tion of virtue and ass%im])tion of vice? — Philo 
JudoeiiSj i, pp. 32, 65.) 

In the New Testament frequent allusions are 
made to the faith of the Pharisees and Saddu- 
cees, with a general disapproval of the doctrines 
of the latter, and approval of the former. 

When Paul stood before the Council at Jeru- 
salem, and perceived that the crowd was com- 
posed of Pharisees and Sadducees, he cried out 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 11 



in the Council, " Men and brethren, I am a 
Pharisee." This announcement produced a dis- 
sension between the Pharisees and" Sadducees, 
and divided the multitude. This division was 
purely doctrinal ; " for the Sadducees say that 
there is no resurrection, neither angels, nor spir- 
its; but the Pharisees confess both." Actsxxii, 8. 
Paul takes sides here against the Sadducees, 
who held the doctrine of the non-existence of 
separate souls. The belief of the Pharisees is 
made plain also ; and they embraced the great 
mass of the Jewish people. We shall have 
occasion to refer to this matter again. 

Christ's controversy with the Sadducees, men- 
tioned in Matt, xxii, 23 ; Mark xii, 18 ; Luke 
xx, 27, indicates that they were the materialists 
of his times, answering to the annihilationists 
of the present day. 

The opinions entertained of the Lord Jesus 
Christ by the Jews, as stated by the disciples, 
(Matt, xvi, 14,) prove that they believed that the 
spirits of dead men were still living. 

" Whom do men say that I the Son of man 



12 ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 

am ? " The disciples replied that there was a 
variety of opinion expressed concerning him. 
Some said he was John the Baptist ; others, that 
he was Elias : while others claimed that he was 
Jeremiah ; and others still that he was one of 
the prophets. These men were all dead ; and 
had the Jews believed that dead men ceased to 
be — had no conscious existence, as materialists 
believe and teach — they could not have believed 
that the spirits of these men were present in the 
person of Jesus Christ. This is a strong ar- 
gument in favor of the Jewish belief on this 
question. 

If Christ did not believe in the separate, con- 
scious existence of souls after death ; if he be- 
lieved that man ceased to be when he ceased 
to breathe ; that only dust remained — is it not 
strange, yea, inexplicable, that, living and teach- 
ing as he did, among a people the great majority 
of whom believed in a state of conscious hap- 
piness or misery after death, he should not 
only never oppose such an erroneous theory, 
but should have employed the same terms 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 13 



which they employed to set forth their obnoxi- 
ous doctrine ; and that, too, without any qualifi- 
cation. Do the advocates of this old Saddu- 
cean error keep silent when an opportunity is 
afforded to defend their peculiar dogma in the 
presence of those who hold different sentiments ? 

In speaking of the state or place of the de- 
parted, the Jews called it " a place of dark- 
ness." Christ calls it " outer darkness." Matt, 
xxii, 13. The Jews called it " unquenchable 
fire." Jesus says, it is " fire that never shall be 
quenched." Mark ix, 45. The Jews called it 
" everlasting punishment." Christ says, " These 
shall go away into everlasting punishment." 
Matt, xxv, 46. The Jews say, " The just shall 
obtain an incorruptible and never fading king- 
dom ; " Christ says, " I appoint unto you a 
kingdom." Luke xxii, 29. The Jews speak of 
the righteous being " guided with, songs, etc., to 
the right hand, to a place called Abraham's 
bosom ; while the unjust are dragged by force 
to the left hand, where they are tormented." 
Christ says, u The beggar died and was car- 



14 ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 



ried by the angels into Abraham's bosom." 
Luke xvi, 22. " And these [the wicked] shall 
go away into everlasting punishment." The 
Jews speak of a chaos deep and large, fixed 
between the good and bad, over which neither 
the just nor the unjust can pass, if " he were 
bold enough to attempt it." Christ says, that 
between the righteous and the wicked there is 
a " great gulf fixed," etc. Luke xvi, 26. 

Now where is the conflict between Christ, the 
so-called Annihilationist, and the great body 
of the Jewish people who believed in the im- 
mortality of the soul, and its separate, conscious 
existence after death ? When he encounters the 
Sadducees he overturns their doctrine ; but the 
opposite sentiment, held by the Pharisees and 
Essenes, he approves ; and in no instance does 
he utter one word in condemnation of it. 

Admitting that this error, if it be one, is as 
gigantic and repulsive as its opposers would have 
us believe — that " it represents our loving God 
as an implacable tyrant," as one says ; that it is 
" a horrible collection of revolting absurdities ; " 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 15 



that it is " utterly opposed," as says another, 
" to our natural conceptions of God " it stag- 
gers the faith of the most devout ; " that another 
calls it "a divine despotism;" another, "the 
slander of the Almighty ; " that it " outrages 
reason and common sense;" "'impeaches God's 
moral character;" is "'the most terrific blas- 
phemy, the most audacious and unmitigated 
libel ever uttered against a God of love," etc., 
— admitting, we say, that the doctrine is as hor- 
rible as is here described, does it not appear 
strange that Jesus should have passed it by with 
so little notice, and especially without disappro- 
bation? that he should have employed terms 
which must have convinced the Pharisees that 
he agreed with them, or that he was not opposed 
to their notions of the soul's immortality, and its 
existence after death, with eternal rewards and 
punishments { 

Suppose that some advocate of annihilation 
should enter a city or village where the great 
mass of the people were believers in what our 
opponents call "'immortal soulism," or the con- 



16 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 



scious existence of separate souls after death, 
with unending punishment for the wicked. He 
is anxious to establish the new faith, and thus 
correct the errors of the people — errors 
" utterly opposed to our natural conceptions of 
God," " the most terrific blasphemy," as well 
as an " impeachment of God's moral character." 
The people are assembled, and the preacher of 
the new faith announces his text — "Matt, xxii, 
13 : " Bind him hand and foot, and take him away, 
and cast him into outer darkness ; there shall be 
weeping and gnashing of teeth." In the course 
of the sermon he repeats, without qualification, 
such Scriptures as, " Fear not them that kill the 
body, and after that have no more that they 
can do. But I will forewarn you whom ye shall 
fear : Fear him, which, after he hath killed, 
hath power to cast into hell." Luke xii, 5. 
"It is better for thee to enter into life halt 
or maimed, rather than having two hands or 
two feet to be be cast into everlasting fire," 
(Matt, xviii, 8,) " where their worm dieth not, 
and the fire is not quenched." Mark ix, 43, 44. 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 17 

He speaks of one (the rich man) as actually 
in hell, tormented in the flames ; and another 
in Abraham's bosom, or paradise, enjoying 
the good things. He professes to hold conver- 
sation with Moses, who had for ages slept 
in the dust of the earth, etc. Who would con- 
jecture that the preacher was doing more than 
simply enforcing a doctrine held in common by 
him and them ? Who would imagine that he 
differed in sentiment from them ? Here is 
Christ preaching to a people who believed in 
the separate existence of souls — in eternal re- 
wards and punishments — in the conscious state 
of the dead, and yet, instead of refuting the 
doctrine and exposing the error of the people, 
lie employs terms which prove in the clearest 
manner that he does not differ in sentiment 
from them upon this most important dogma. 
These considerations lay a foundation for a 
direct Scriptural argument against the doctrine 
we here oppose. To this we call the reader's 
special attention. 

With regard to the materialistic doctrine of 
2 



18 ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 



the sleep of the dead, and the annihilation of 
the wicked, there is, as is usual among error- 
ists, a strange want of harmony. On one point, 
however, they all agree, namely, that death, the 
penalty with which God has threatened sin, is 
the absolute extinction of the being of the sinner. 
Just when this extinction takes place, whether at 
death, or at the judgment, or at some subsequent 
period, they are not agreed. 

They all agree in asserting that " immortal- 
ity" by which they mean " eternal life," or 
simple being, is the gift of God by faith in 
Jesus. By far the greater number of their 
authorities hold that an extinction of conscious 
being takes place at death, to be revived at the 
judgment. A small number only believe that 
the wicked become extinct at death, and for 
them remains no resurrection. They hold that 
man and beast come alike from the "dust;" 
both have the same breath" and both die 
alike. 

They generally believe that the existence of 
a " soul " or " spirit," as an entity separate 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 19 



from the body, is nowhere taught in the 
Scriptures, and that no conscious soul or spirit 
survives the death of the body. Upon these 
points, also, there are differences of opinion 
among them. 

Mr. Zenas Campbell says : " No Scripture or 
philosophy has ever yet been shown to prove 
the mind any thing more than an attribute of 
the living, organized dust ; and if so, it must 
cease with the life of the body." — Age of Gospel 
Light. This being the case, the whole being 
becomes extinct at death. 

Mr. Jacob Blain says : " The Bible plainly 
tells us that men and beasts are made of the 
same material — ' dust, 5 and that both have 'the 
same breath,' and that they both die alike." 
Again, " The existence of a soul or spirit as an 
entity within us is only inferred from a few un- 
certain texts which can be explained another 
way, while numerous plain texts and the sense 
of the Bible are against it." — Death not Life. 
Pp. 39, 42.) 

Mr. Thomas Reed says : " iSo conscious spirit 



20 ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED, 



or soul survives the death of man.'* — Bible 
versus Tradition, p. 121. 

Mr. George Storrs is bold, and savs : " I re- 
gard the phrase ' immaterial ' as one which 
properly belongs to the things which are not: a 
sound without sense or meaning : a mere cloak 
to hide the nakedness of the theory of an im- 
mortal soul in man.''— Six Sermons^ p. 29. 

The question at issue being a question of fact, 
our appeal must be to the word of God. He 
who made us, and appoints the destiny of all 
souls, is supposed to be able to impart the most 
satisfactory information on the subject. And 
here it is but just to say that our opponents 
seem to rely less on the word of God than upon 
other sources of evidence. 

Mr. Hudson has produced the most able and 
elaborate work yet written in defense of this 
dogma — a volume of 470 pages — and yet only 
sixty-seven pages of the work are devoted to the 
Scripture argument, and even these are a medley 
of Scripture and something else. Subsequently 
he published a small volume of Scriptural argu- 



AXSTHILATTON OF THE WICKED. 21 



ments, "to meet," lie says, "the convenience 
of those who rely for their views of future life 
upon their reading and interpretation of the 
Scriptures." Then comes a very remarkable 
confession, with a most humiliating doubt : 
" We doubt if an exclusively Scriptural argu- 
ment will prove satisfactory to very many, 
however clearly it may appear to be made out." 
— Christ our Life, p. 3. 

But our appeal is "to the law and to the 
testimony, for if they speak not according to 
these, it is because they have no light in 
them." 

Let the reader keep in mind what we have 
proved, namely, that the Jews, among whom 
Christ spent his life, believed in the doctrine 
which our opponents reject, a small sect only 
dissenting; and. with these latter Christ was 
ever coming in conflict on this peculiar dogma. 
To have been true to his declared mission (ac- 
cording to our opponents) he should have come 
in conflict with the great mass of the people. 
But he not only does not oppose them in this, 



22 ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 



but employs language well calculated to con- 
firm them in their belief. 

I. The Scriptures make a clear distinction 
between body and spirit, between the material and 
immaterial, in man. 

Man, as a physical being, is distinguished 
from God, as a spirit; from holy angles, and 
from fallen angels, known as " evil," or " un- 
clean spirits." 

God is said to be the " God of the spirits of 
all flesh." If there be no distinction between 
" spirit " and " flesh," there can be no sense in 
such a use of terms. 

Job xiv, 22 : " But his flesh upon him shall 
have pain, and his soul within him shall mourn." 
Here is the " flesh " without, or " upon him," 
in " pain/' and the " soul within " mourning, 
and both constituting one man. ~No language 
can be more explicit. 

Isa. xxxi, 3 : " Now the Egyptians are men, 
and not God ; and their horses flesh, and not 
spirit." If there be any distinction between 



ANNIHILATION" OF THE WICKED. 23 



" men " and " God " in this verse, then there 
must be a distinction between "flesh" and 
" spirit. 53 

1 Cor. vi, 20 : " Glorify God in your body 
and in your spirit, which are God's." If there 
be no distinction between "body" and "spirit" 
how is this duty to be performed ? 

2 Cor. iv, 16 : " Though our outward man 
perish, yet the inward man is rAewed day by 
day." The " outward man" can mean only the 
body ; and while that is perishing or decaying, 
there is an " inward man " whose vigor is not 
affected by this decay of the body. This u in- 
ward man" is the soul, which is not dependent 
upon the body for its vigor. 

Jesus appeared to his disciples after his resur- 
rection, (Luke xxiv, 36-40,) and they were " terri- 
fied and affrighted, and supposed that they had 
seen a spirit" Seen a spirit ! 2so, never, if 
they had been Materialists. But Jesus disabused 
their minds : " Behold my hands and my feet, 
that it is I myself : handle me, and see ; for a 
spirit hath not flesh and bones, as ye see me 



24 ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 



have. And when he had thus spoken, he 
showed them his hands and his feet." 

Mark these facts: 1. That a "spirit" which 
they supposed they had seen, (though Material- 
ists, as our opponents claim,) was an entity which 
had neither "flesh" nor "bones," that is, was 
not material. 2. Christ proves to them that he 
is not a " spirit" by showing them his " hands " 
and his "feet." Can any thing more clearly 
prove the distinction between body and spirit ? 

"Let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness 
of the flesh and spirit." 2 Cor. vii, 1. 

" Flesh," here, embraces all of man that is 
material, and with Materialists there is noth- 
ing else ; but with the apostle there is some- 
thing else— a "spirit," or man's immaterial 
nature. 

James ii, 26: "For as the body without the 
spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead 
also." The apostle assumes, what was firmly 
believed at the time, that man is composed of 
body and spirit. He assumes also that this fact 
was even better understood than the connection 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 25 



between faith and works. He shows that faith 
is not saving unless it produces good works, 
any more than that a body can live without the 
presence of the spirit. This illustration would 
have been utterly meaningless had the people 
believed that body and spirit were included in 
a single entity. 

II. Any reasoning which would deny to man 
an immortal or spiritual nature, would deprive 
God of such a nature, as the same terms are 
applied to both. 

1. Let us consider the term soul. Isa. i, 14. 
" Tour new moons and your appointed feasts 
my soul hateth." This is spoken of God. 
Deut. vi, 5 : " Thou shalt love the Lord thy 
God, with all thy soid" This is spoken of man. 
In God the soul is the subject of hatred / in 
man it is the subject of love. Does 6C soul" 
mean " spirit " when applied to God, and body 
when applied to man ? 

"Isa. xlii, 1 : "Behold my servant, whom I 
uphold ; mine elect, in whom my soul delight- 



26 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 



eth." This is spoken of God. Isa, Iv, 2 : " Let 
your soul delight itself in fatness." In these 
texts the same word is employed to denote the 
mind of man that is employed to denote the 
mind of God. Both are represented as the sub- 
ject of a like passion, which could not be if 
Materialism be true. 

Job xxiii, 13 : " What his soul desireth, even 
that he doeth." This is spoken of God. Prov. 
xxi, 10 : " The soul of the wicked desireth evil." 
Here the soul of God and of man are made sub- 
jects of a like emotion. 

Of God it is said, " Shall not my soul be 
avenged on such a nation as this? " Jer. v, 9. 
Of man, " Come unto me : hear, and your soul 
shall live." Isa, lv, 3. K"ow any criticism by 
which the word soul when applied to man is 
made to mean life, breath* wind, etc., makes 
with equal force against the spiritual nature of 
God, and most effectually materializes him. 
Rev. Dr. Whedon says, " How this denial of the 
separate existence of pure spirit is saved from 
materializing God, and so producing either 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 



27 



atheism or pantheism, we are not sufficiently 
read in the system to understand." Quarterly 
Review, January, 1869. 

2. Let us consider the term spirit. Of God it 
is said, The Spirit of God moved upon the 
face of the water.'' Gen. i, 2. Of man it is said, 
" The spirit of man is the candle of the Lord." 
Prov. xx, 27. 

Of God it is said, "By his Spirit he hath 
garnished the heavens." Job xxvi, 13. Of man 
it is said, " But there is a spirit in man : and 
the inspiration of the Almighty givetli them 
understanding." Job xxxii, 8. 

Of God it is said, " Whither shall I go from 
thy spirit f " Psa, cxxxix, 17. Of man it is said, 
" "Who knoweth the spirit of man that goeth 
upward?" Eccles. iii, 21. 

It is said, u God is a spirtiP John iv, 24, 
Of man it is said, " And the spirit shall return 
unto God who gave it." Eccles. xii, 7. 

Stephen prayed, " Lord Jesus, receive my 
spirit" Of God it is said, " The things of God 
knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God." 



28 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 



2s"o comment is necessary on the foreo;oin£ 
Scriptures, further than to say, that any criticism 
which will make those Scriptures which apply 
to man harmonize with the idea that his spirit 
is an attribute of, or identical with, his material 
nature, must, to be consistent, involve us in the 
absurdity of making God material. 

There are a class of Scriptures which so con- 
nect the spirit of man with the Spirit of God 
as to prove most conclusively the immateiial- 
ity of man's nature, or the materiality of the 
Divine nature. 

Eom. viii, 16 : " The Spirit itself beareth wit- 
ness with our spirit, that we are the children of 
God." The same word is employed in the origi- 
nal to denote spirit in both cases. If by " our 
spirit " is meant our body, or matter, or any 
material substance, then " the Spirit " may 
mean a material God. 

John iv, 24 : " God is a Spirit, and they that 
worship him must worship him in spirit and in 
truth." Here the word "spirit" being applied 
to both God and man, proves that both have 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 29 



like qualities of nature. If the text proves that 
God is spirit, and not matter, [and if it does not 
prove this, there is no Scripture which does 
prove it,] the conclusion must be admitted that 
man also possesses a nature which is not 
material. 

III. Having proved that man has a soul, or 
spirit, distinct from matter, we shall proceed to 
prove that this soul, or spirit, is not dependent 
on the body, or matter, for its existence, but may, 
and does exist separate from it. 

1. Paul believed it possible for the spirit of a 
man to exist out of the body, or separate from 
it. 2 Cor. xii, 2-4 : " I knew a man in Christ 
about fourteen years ago, (whether in the body 
I cannot tell ; or whether out of the body I can- 
not tell ; God knoweth :) such a one caught up 
to the third heaven." On the supposition that 
Paul was a Materialist ; that he believed that 
the body is the whole of man ; that the existence 
of an entity, as a part of man, capable of exist- 
ing separate from his body, was an impossibility 



80 ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 



—how is his language to be interpreted ? Had 
Paul been a Materialist he must have known 
whether he was " in the body " or " out of the 
body." He must have known that to be " out 
of the body" was an impossibility. 

He was " caught up into Paradise, and heard 
unspeakable words, which it is not lawful for a 
man to utter." No other interpretation can be 
given to this than that it teaches the possibility 
of a spirit not only going u out of the body," 
but going to the third heaven, even to Para- 
dise ; and while there, hearing words not lawful 
to be repeated here. It proves that Paul be- 
lieved, if Materialists do not, that he possessed 
a spirit capable of going out of his body, and 
existing separate from it. 

This has been the ugliest text in the Bible for 
Materialists to manage ; hence their ablest writ- 
ers generally pass it by in silence. It has never 
been fairly met ; it never can be : for it proves 
in the most convincing manner the separability 
of the spirit from the body. 

2. 2 Cor. v, 1-8 : " For we know that, if our 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 31 



earthly house of this tabern-acle were dissolved, 
we have a building of God, a house not made 
with hands, eternal in the heavens." For in this 
we groan, earnestly desiring to be clothed upon 
with our house which is from heaven : if so be 
that being clothed we shall not be found naked. 
For we that are in this tabernacle do groan, be- 
ing burdened : not for that we would be un- 
clothed, but clothed upon, that mortality might 
be swallowed up of life. . . . Therefore we are 
always confident, knowing that, whilst we are 
at home in the body, we are absent from the 
Lord. . . . "We are confident, I say, and willing 
rather to be absent from the body, and to be 
present with the Lord." On the supposition 
that spirit and tody are one, what does Paul 
mean by " at home in the body," and " absent 
from the body ? " What is meant by putting 
off "this tabernacle," and being " clothed with 
our house which is from heaven ? " To be with 
Christ is to be " absent from the body." But 
to be " absent from the body " is an impossibil- 
ity, according to Materialism ; hence, nothing 



32 ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 



is gained by laving off " this tabernacle." In 
fact there is no such thing as laying off " this 
tabernacle ; " for the or " We " who does 
it is simply the " tabernacle " laid off, according 
to Materialists. It is the house or tabernacle 
taking itself down. 

3. Phil, i, 21-24 : " For to me to live is Christ, 
and to die is gain. But if I live in the flesh, this 
is the fruit of my labor : yet what I shall choose 
I wot not. For I am in a strait betwixt two, 
having a desire to depart, and to be with Christ ; 
which is far better. Nevertheless to abide in 
the flesh is more needful for you.' 5 Who that 
has not a favorite creed to support would ever 
conclude that this declaration could fall from 
the lips of a Materialist ? How death, or non- 
being, could be gain to a man who was treas- 
uring up, by his " light afflictions," a " far more 
exceeding and eternal weight of glory," we are 
unable to determine. Where is the earnest 
Christian who would not prefer labor for Christ 
to sleep, or non-being ? He is not worthy of the 
Christian name who prefers the sluggard's sleep 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 33 

to earnest labor. Abiding " in the flesh " means 
living in the body. " To depart " means simply 
going out of the body ; and going out, or away 
from the body,, is to " be with Christ." Had 
Paul been a Materialist, or an Annihilationist, 
he must have known that to " abide in the 
flesh " for the salvation of sinners and the good 
of the Church would not have delayed the 
period of his being with Christ one hour : for, 
according to the doctrine of our opponents, he 
is not with Christ even to this present time. 
He could have continued his labors until he 
was as old as Methuselah, and then be with 
Christ just as soon as though he had died that 
day. How could he have desired to depart and 
be with Christ, unless being with Christ was to 
be the result of that departure? Yet, if the 
doctrine we oppose be true, that result was not 
hastened one moment by his departure. This 
text has accordingly annoyed our opponents. 
They confess that " a fair construction of this 
text " would be that Paul " expected to be with 

Christ immediately on his departure.' 5 But 

3 



34 ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED, 



they think that there are Scriptures against it ; 
hence the " fair construction 55 of the text must 
not be accepted. 

IY. Paul avows his belief not only in the 
resurrection of the dead, loth of the just and 
unjust, hut in the existence of "angels and 
spirits" 

1. Acts xxiii, 6 : " But when Paul perceived 
that the one part were Sadducees, and the other 
Pharisees, he cried out in the*council, Men 
and brethren, I am a Pharisee, the son of a 
Pharisee." 

This profession of Paul produced a dissension 
between the Sadducees and the Pharisees. 
The cause of this dissension is said to be this : 
"For the Sadducees say that there is no res- 
urrection, neither angel nor spirit : but the 
Pharisees confess both." On this announce- 
ment, the Scribes, who were of the Pharisees, 
arose and took Paul's part, saying, " We find 
no evil in this man." They declare what seems 
to be a clear confirmation of their belief in 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 



35 



angels and spirits. " But if a spirit or an angel 
hath spoken to him, let us not fight against God." 

What is meant here by " angels " and " spir- 
its " is not difficult to understand. Mr. Barnes 
has the following comment on the passage: 
"Neither angel — That there are no angels. They 
deny the existence of good and bad angels. 
Nor spirit — Or soul. They held that there was 
nothing but matter. They were Materialists, 
and supposed that all the operations which we 
ascribe to mind could be traced to some modifi- 
cation of matter/' 

As we have before shown, the controversy 
between the Pharisees and the Sadducees em- 
braced two points — the " resurrection of the 
dead," and the existence of " angels and spirits." 
Paul here publicly professes to be of those who 
held the anti-materialistic view of souls and 
spirits; turning a cold shoulder to those who ad- 
vocated a doctrine, to the spread of which he had 
devoted his life, provided he were a Materialist. 
There is no way to interpret the apostle's aver- 
ments in this case with a shade of consistency, 



36 ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 



without admitting that he held the doctrine of* 
the separate existence of spirits or souls. 

Y, Christ's controversy with the Sadducees 
(Luke xx. 37) is a defense of the same doctrine. 

" Now that the dead are raised, even Moses 
showed at the bush, when he calleth the Lord 
the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and 
the God of Jacob. For he is not a God of the 
dead, but of the living : for all live unto him." 
Matt, xxii, 31, 32. When God made this an- 
nouncement at Horeb with regard to Abraham, 
Isaac, and Jacob, the last named had been dead 
about 200 years; and yet God declares that he 
is their God. Christ adds : " He is not a God 
of the dead, but of the living." Then, to make 
the doctrine of universal application, he is care- 
ful to add, " All live unto him ;" as much as to 
say, Not only are "Abraham. Isaac, and Jacob " 
living, but the statement is true of " all men." 
Logically, the argument would stand thus : 
He is not the God of the dead, but of the liv- 
ing. He is the God of Abraham, of Isaac, 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 37 



and of Jacob ; therefore Abraham, Isaac, and 
Jacob must be living. Let it be remembered 
that the Sadducees believed that the whole man 
became extinct at death; that neither soul nor 
body would ever be reproduced. "With them 
the •immortality of the soul, or spirit, and the 
resurrection of the dead, stood or fell together. 

To prove that the soul existed after death was 
to silence their objections to the resurrection 
of the body. It was necessary, therefore, in a 
discussion with the Sadducees, to prove the sepa- 
rate existence of spirits, in order to prove the 
resurrection of the dead. As there could be no 
resurrection unless the soul maintained a con- 
scious existence after death, and as the Sad- 
ducees denied such conscious existence, it was 
necessary for Christ to prove it, in order to lay 
a proper foundation for a belief in the resurrec- 
tion of the dead. 

The fact that Christ, all through his ministry, 
sided with the Pharisees against the Sadducees, 
who were the Materialists of his times, is an argu- 
ment against Materialism not easily answered. 



38 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 



YI. Christ's language to the dying thief, (Luke 
, xxiii, 43,) " To-day shalt thou be with me in Para- 
dise/ 5 is one of the strongest proofs of the con- 
scious existence of soul after the death of the body. 

We will not detain the reader with any criti- 
cisms on " Paradise/' or on the attempts of Ma- 
terialists to change the sense of this text, by 
changing the pointing. It is only necessary to 
say that this last method is arrant nonsense. 
As to the location of " Paradise," we need only 
say that it must be in or near the " third 
heaven/' where people do not sleep, as Paul 
heard vjords there ^not lawful to be uttered/' 

But how, it may be asked, could the thief be 
in Paradise that day with Christ when three days 
later he declares, " I am not yet ascended \ " 

This question may be satisfactorily answered. 

1. As a Divine being, Christ was in Paradise 
that day. He says, "the Son of man is in 
heaven." John iii, 13. 

2. As a disembodied spirit he mi^ht have 
been in Paradise that day. For, before his 
body was placed in Joseph's tomb, he had said, 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 



39 



"Father, into thy hands I commit my spirit ; and 
having said this, he gave up the ghost," 

3. But as a risen Saviour he had not ascended. 
His ascension did not take place until many 
days after the crucifixion. So as a Divine being, 
and as a disembodied spirit, Christ could have 
been with the thief that day in Paradise, and yet, 
as a risen, glorified Saviour, not have ascended 
until some forty days later. This interpretation 
makes the Scripture both plain and simple. 

VII. Take the case of the appearance of 
Moses on the Mount of Transfiguration. 

Moses died in the land of Moab, and was 
buried in a valley over against Bethpeor, etc., 
(Deut. xxxiv, 5, 6 ;) and yet, nearly fifteen hun- 
dred years after he had become extinct — had 
ceased to be, soul and body, according to Ma- 
terialists, he appears on Mount Tabor with him 
who had gone to heaven in a chariot of fire. 

There is not the slightest evidence that Moses 
was raised from the dead for this special pur- 
pose. Materialists say, that if Moses did really 



40 ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 

appear— of which they have serious doubts- 
he was raised from non-being for that special 
purpose, and after he had performed his mission 
was sent back again to non-existence, to be 
known and to know no more until the general 
resurrection. If this be so, Moses must have 
possessed a spirit of submission beyond most 
men, or he would have plead earnestly to have 
been spared another two or three thousand 
years 5 slumber. Then, how this idea of Moses's 
resurrection is to be harmonized with the fact 
that Christ is the " first-fruits " of the resurrec- 
tion, Materialists have not been kind enough 
to inform us. Here is the spirit of one whose 
body had slumbered in a grave, in the land of 
Moab, for fifteen hundred years, standing on 
Mount Tabor, seen of the favored three, and 
conversing with Jesus concerning his passion; 
proving beyond all cavil that the soul lives 
after the body is dead. 

VIII. We urge the following additional argu- 
ments against the doctrine of Annihilation. 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 41 

1. It makes no distinction between the state 
of a sinner before and after the resurrection, 
raising; him from a state of non-existence to 
consign him to the same state again. 

A large majority of those who believe in the 
final annihilation of the wicked, believe also in 
a resurrection, "both of the just and of the un- 
just." But why raise the wicked from a state 
of unconscious, if not absolute, non-being, to con- 
sign them to the same state again ? Many An- 
nihilationists, not being able to see the reason for 
this, reject, consistently, we think, the doctrine 
of the resurrection of the wicked altogether. 

2. The doctrine makes no distinction in re- 
gard to the degrees of punishment — a doctrine 
clearly set forth in the word of God. 

Kev. George Storrs says, {Herald of Life,) 
66 As to degrees of punishment in a future state 
we challenge the evidence in the word of God 
of any such thing. It is purely a human spec- 
ulation." 

We will let the word of God speak for itself. 
Christ says of the " Scribes and Pharisees, hyp- 



42 ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 

ocrites," "Ye shall receive the greater dam- 
nation." Matt, xxiii, 14. Does not this teach 
that there are degrees of " damnation n for the 
wicked ? If there are no degrees of damnation 
it would be impossible for it to be " greater " in 
one case than in another. 

Luke xii, 47, 48 : " And that servant, which 
knew his lord's will, and prepared not himself, 
neither did according to his will, shall be beaten 
with many stripes. But he that knew not, and 
did commit things worthy of stripes, shall be 
beaten with few stripes. For unto whomsoever 
much is given, of him shall be much required ; 
and to whom men have committed much, of 
him they will ask the more." Do not the 
"many" and the "few stripes" clearly prove 
that there are degrees of punishment ? 

When the Scriptures speak of receiving ac- 
cording to the " deeds done in the body," and 
" according to their works " — when they repre- 
sent that it will be " more tolerable in the day 
of judgment " for one class of sinners than for 
another — he must be blinded by his dogma- 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 



43 



God, who is not able to see degrees of punish- 
ment for the unsaved. 

There are no degrees in annihilation ; conse- 
quently, if that be the penalty for sin it will 
fall on all alike ; but as punishment will not fall 
on all alike, annihilation cannot be the penalty 
for sin. 

3. This doctrine makes death the extreme 
penalty of the law, in opposition to the Script- 
ures, which speak of a "much sorer punish- 
ment" than death for those who do " despite 
unto the Spirit of grace." 

Heb. x, 28, 29 : " He that despised Moses's 
law died without mercy under two or three 
witnesses : of how much sorer punishment, sup- 
pose ye, shall he be thought worthy, who hath 
trodden under foot the Son of God, and hath 
counted the blood of the covenant, wherewith 
he was sanctified, an unholy thing, and hath 
done despite unto the Spirit of grace ? " 

Death, which, our opponents say, is capital 
punishment — and hence the extreme penalty 
of the law — was inflicted u without mercy " on 



4A 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 



those " who despised Moses's law." They re- 
ceived, say Annihilationists, by being blotted 
out of being, all the punishment it was possible 
for them to receive. But we are informed by 
Paul that there is a sorer or worse punishment 
than even death for those who reject Christ, and 
trample under foot the Son of God, and count 
his blood an unholy thing. 

Mr. Storrs attempts to dispose of this .argu- 
ment in the following manner. He says, " This 
objection is founded on one solitary text, and 
that misconstrued. The Syriac version, trans- 
lated by Prof. Murdock, formerly of the Ando- 
ver Theological Institute, reads, ' How much 
more, think ye, will he receive capital punish- 
ment,' etc., instead of sorer ; making the greater 
certainty of the death punishment." — Herald of 
Life, March 10, 1869. 

This is a very remarkable authority. Instead 
of consulting the original, or some authorized 
translation, Mr. Storrs resorts to a translation 
of a translation — Prof. Murdock's translation 
of the Syriac translation — and by this attempts 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 45 



to disprove the doctrine of the Authorized Ver- 
sion. But Mr. Storrs must know that the word 
rendered "sorer" has no such meaning as 
" much more" or " more certain" Xetpov, 
(cheiron,) according to Robinson, means worse, 
spoken of estate or condition: of punishment, 
as worse, more severe. It is from tcaicog—iad, ill, 
evil — and never has the sense of more certain, or 
much more. 

If we consult the New Testament use of the 
word we shall find that no such meaning is 
given to it as Mr. Storrs forces out of his second- 
hand translation. With the exception of Heb. 
x, 29, the word is invariably rendered worse. 

Matt, ix, 16 : " No man putteth a piece of 
new cloth unto an old garment ; for that which 
is put in to fill it up taketh from the garment, 
and the rent is made (cheiro7i) worse y " that is, 
according to Mr. Storrs, much more certain 
than before mended. 

Matt, xii, 45 : " The last state of that man is 
{cheirona) worse than the first that is, much 
more certain. He is more certain to have an end 



46 ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 

than a beginning. But how the taking of seven 
other spirits more wicked than himself could 
make such a result more certain we are not in- 
formed. 

Matt, xxvii, 64 : " So the last error shall be 
(cheiron) worse than the first ; " that is, much 
more certain. 

Mark v, 26 : " And had suffered many things 
of many physicians, and had spent all that she 
had, and was nothing bettered, but rather grew 
{cheiron) worse" that is, much more certain. 
Much more certain than what ? 

John v, 14 : " Behold, thou art made whole : 
sin no more, lest a {cheiron) worse thing come 
unto thee ; " that is, a much more certain thing. 
How a much more certain thing could come 
upon him than the " thirty and eight years' " 
infirmity, we are not told. But how a worse 
thing could come upon him we can easily 
understand. 

2 Pet, ii, 20: "For if after they have es- 
caped the pollutions of the world through the 
knowledge of the Lord and Saviour Jesus 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 47 



Christ, they are again entangled therein, and 
overcome, the latter end is (cheirona) worse than 
the beginning," that is, much more certain. 
How the last or latter end of a man can be 
worse than the beginning is not difficult to un- 
derstand ; but how it can be more certain will 
require the logic of Mr. Storrs, or some other 
Annihilationist, to make plain. 

1 Tim. y, 8 : " But if any provide not for his 
own, and especially for those of his own house, 
he hath denied the faith, and is (cheiron) worse 
than an infidel," that is, much more certain 
than an infidel. 

2 Tim. iii, 13 : " But evil men and seducers 
shall wax worse and worse, deceiving, and being 
deceived that is, doubly certain, amounting to 
a terrible certainty. 

Ordinary discernment, coupled with common 
honesty, will discover the utter fallacy, not to 
say unpardonable wickedness, of all such at- 
tempts to wrest the Scriptures for the purpose 
of sustaining a favorite dogma. 

4. The doctrine of annihilation makes the 



48 ANNIHILATION OF THE "WICKED. 



punishment of the wicked to consist in sim- 
ple non-existences in direct opposition to those 
Scriptures which represent it as conscious 
suffering. 

Mr. Storrs says, " The Bible affirms the 
wages of sin is death* and nowhere represents 
the punishment of the wicked in the future life 
to be conscious suffering/* — Herald of Life, 
May 10, 1S69. Let us inquire what the Script- 
ures do teach on this important subject. 

Matt, xxv, 30 : " Cast ye the unprofitable 
servant into outer darkness : there shall be 
weeping and gnashing of teeth.'' 

Luke xiii, 23 : " There shall be weeping and 
gnashing of teeth, when ye shall see Abraham, 
and Isaac, and Jacob, and all the prophets, in the 
kino-dom of God. and vou vourselves thrust out." 

Luke xvi, 23 : " And in hell he lifted up his 
eyes, being in torments." 

Rom. ii, 8. 9: "Indignation and wrath, trib- 
ulation and anguish, upon every soul of man 
that doeth evil ; of the Jew first, and also of 
the Gentile. " 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 



49 



Luke xii, -±7 ; " And that servant which 
knew his lord's will, and prepared not himself, 
neither did according to his will, shall be beaten 
with many stripes." 

Luke xvi, 24: " Send Lazarus, that he may 
dip the tip of his finger in water, and cool my 
tongue; for I am tormented in this flame." 

Mark ix, 44 : " Where their worm dieth not, 
and the fire is not quenched." 

These Scriptures relate to the punishment of 
the wicked. If " weeping and gnashing of 
teeth if " being in torments ;" if " tribulation 
and anguish if being " beaten with manv 
stripes;" if being " tormented in this flame ;" if 
"their worm dieth not" — if all these do not 
teach conscious suffering, they do not teach any 
thing relating to suffering. If the penalty of 
the law be annihilation, conscious suffering is 
excluded. But conscious suffering is not ex- 
cluded ; therefore, annihilation is not the penalty 
of the law. 

5. The doctrine of annihilation makes the 

sufferings of the wicked terminate at death, or, 

4 



50 ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 



at most, at the judgment, in opposition to the 
Scriptures, which represent them as eternal. 
Mr. Storrs savs, " Nowhere is there an assertion 
in the Bible that represents the conscious suffer- 
ing of the wicked to be eternal." 

Let it be remembered that Annihilationists 
hold that the punishment of the wicked, what- 
ever it may be, is eternal. " Death holds 
them," says Mr. Storrs, " in its eternal domin- 
ion ; they shall never live again." He says again : 
" It is an unbroken death state that is the 
punishment." The only question to be settled 
is, Is that state one of mere non-existence, or is 
it a conscious state ? 

All punishment must consist either in pain, 
or loss, or hoth. As Annihilationists exclude 
the idea of pain, the penalty of the law, in their 
view, must consist simply and solely in loss. 
But what is it the loss of ? not of pleasure, for 
of that the sinner has none while out of Christ. 
It must be the loss of simple existence. But the 
loss of simple existence, under the circumstances, 
cannot be an evil to a sinner — a punishment — 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 51 



but a great blessing. Punishment must be the 
loss of what, to a sinner, is valuable, or it is no 
punishment. But existence to a sinner, instead 
of being valuable, is a positive evil, and, conse- 
quently, to be deprived of it is no punishment. 
" To cease to exist cannot be punishment of 
loss, only so far as the existence taken away 
involves happiness ; but the existence of sinners, 
who shall be such after the resurrection, will not 
involve happiness, but misery ; and therefore to 
cease to exist will not involve a loss of happi- 
ness, but an exemption from suffering, and 
cannot be a penalty or punishment." — Leds 
Theology, p. 326. 

The term "punishment," according to the 
best English authority, means " pain or suffer- 
ing inflicted on a person for a crime or offense." 
"To afflict with pain, loss, or calamity, for a 
crime or fault." " To chastise." " To reward 
with pain or suffering," etc. — Webster. 

The Greek word noXaatv, Icolasin, from 
Tcolazo, signifies " chastisement, punishment, tor- 
ment, torture," etc. The English and the Greek 



52 ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED, 



terms, in their significations, are as far removed 
from the idea of annihilation as light is from 
darkness. To chastise, torment, afflict with loss, 
cannot be affirmed of those who have ceased to 
be, but of those who possess conscious existence. 

As, then, the punishment of the wicked, what- 
ever it may be, is confessed by Annihilationists 
to be eternal, the conclusion is irresistible, that 
it must be endless conscious suffering. 

6. The doctrine of annihilation stamps as a 
deception all the horrors of the wicked, as well 
as the blissful hopes of the righteous at death. 

Hear the dying Altamont : " This body is 
all weakness and pain ; but my soul, as if 
strung up by torment to greater strength and 
spirit, is full powerful to reason ; full mighty to 
suffer. And that which triumphs in the jaws of 

mortality is doubtless immortal." " Didst thou 

«/ 

feel half the mountain that is on me, thou 
would st struggle with the martyr for his stake, 
and bless heaven for the flames : that is not an 
everlasting flame ; that is not an unquenchable 
fire." 



ANNIHILATION" OF THE WICKED. 53 



Said an English nobleman on his death-bed, 
" It is not giving up my breath, it is Dot being 
for ever insensible, at which I shrink ; it is the 
terrible hereafter — the something beyond the 
grave — at which I recoil." The last hours of 
Paine, Voltaire, Chesterfield, and others, prove 
that before apostates and enemies of Christ close 
their probation, God permits them to see the 
coming torments which await them in the world 
of woe. 

Stephen, when dying, instead of looking into 
the grave, where, according to Annihilationists, 
he must remain unconscious for ages, looks np 
steadfastly into heaven, and sees Jesus at the 
right hand of God ; and, while gazing upon His 
ineffable glory, his face became shining like that 
of an angel, and he cried, " Lord Jesus, receive 
my spirit ! " Where \ Not where Jesus was 
not, but where he was, namely, "in heaven, at 
the right hand of God." As died Stephen, so 
die good men. 

When Dr. Fisk was dying, as he was being 
moved from his chair he exclaimed, " From 



54 ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 

the chair to the throne ! " Instead of the 
throne, was it to be the sleep of ages in the 
grave ? 

Rev. William Grimshaw, a few moments 
before his death, being asked by a friend how 
he was, said : " I am as happy as I can be on 
earth, and as sure of glory as if I was in it. I 
have nothing to do but to step out of this bed 
into heaven. I have my feet on the threshold 
already." Were these heaven-inspired hopes to 
be rewarded with unconscious existence in the 
grave for a period to mortals unknown ? 

Dr. Payson said, when about to die, " It 
seems as if my soul had found a pair of new 
wings, and was so eager to try them that, in 
her fluttering, she would rend the fine net- 
works of the body to pieces." Were these holy 
men deceived '? Did God open heaven to their 
vision only to close it and send them to the 
sleep of ages ? Instead of their feet resting on 
the threshold of the city of God, ready to enter, 
were they only standing at the grave's mouth, 
which was to be the home of their spirits for 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 55 



ages? Were their immortal songs, sung so 
sweetly at the door of the eternal mansion, to 
be hushed in the sleep of ages? God nevei 
deceives his children thus. 

7. The doctrine we oppose is a prime doc- 
trine of infidelity, and should be rejected by 
every Christian. 

"We can but regret that men who claim to 
love God and believe in Jesus should be aid- 
ing, as we believe they are, the Prince of 
darkness in forwarding his designs to ruin men, 
by lessening the force of the Divine threaten- 
ings against sin. Isaac Taylor has very justly 
said : " The quarrel of the world with Chris- 
tianity comes to its issue upon this doctrine 
of future retribution." — Sat. Night, p. 219. 
Speaking of Democritus and Epicurus, Plutarch, 
says, " They taught that the soul is corruptible, 
and perishes with the body." It is known that 
Epicurus taught that the son! comes from a 
material source, exists in a material system, is 
nourished by material food, grows and is ma- 
tured with the material body, and declines with 



56 ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 

its decline, and hence must die when it dies. — 
Landes. He was a most determined foe of 
the doctrine of immortality. Bayle speaks of 
their theory thus : " Death disunites the parts 
of these bodies, but destroys nothing of their 
substance. Those that the earth supplies are 
restored to the earth, and those which descend 
from the regions of ether, ascend thither again." 
In a work by Ellis and Reed, ("Bible versus 
Tradition") they say on Eccles. xii, 7 : " The 
ruah [spirit] goes to God who gave it. Now if 
God intends to restore this ruah to the man so 
that he may live again, where does God bring 
this ruah from ? We shall see that it is not the 
same ruah, but ruah of the same Jcind, though 
perhaps less diluted with atmospheric air? 
Thus we see that it is God's ruah — one universal 
principle pervading the atmosphere? 66 It is a 
living thing, though the cause of life, but 
which our honest translators have translated 
wind.' 5 

Zenas Campbell says, "No Scripture or phi- 
losophy has ever yet been shown to prove the 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 57 



mind any thing more than an attribute of the 
living organized dust ; and if so, it must cease 
with the life of the body." — Age of Gospel 
Light How do these views differ from those 
of Epicurus ? 

Eusebius, who lived in the third century, 
and wrote the first " History of the Primitive 
Church," after the Acts of the Apostles, in 
speaking of the heretics of his times says, 
" But about this time, also, other men sprang 
up in Arabia, as the propagators of false opin- 
ions. These asserted that the human soul, as 
long as the present state of the world existed, 
perished at death, and died with the body, but 
that it would be raised again with the body at 
the time of the resurrection. And as a consider- 
able council was held on account of this, Origen 
being again requested, likewise here discussed 
the point in question with so much force, that 
those who had before been led astray, complete- 
ly changed their opinion." — P. 253. 

Voltaire says, {Phil. Pic, vol. i, pp. 42-48,) 
" My being rewarded or punished after death 



58 



AXXIHILATIOX OF THE WICKED. 



requires that something which feels and thinks 
in me must continue to subsist after me. Xow 
as no part in me has any thought or sense 
before my birth, why should it after my death \ 
What can this incomprehensible part of myself 
be ? "Will the humming of the bee continue 
after the end of its existence ? Thus the soul 
itself, which signifies our memory, our reason, 
our 2^cissio?is, is only a bare word. 

" How can I be rewarded or punished when I 
shall cease to be myself, when nothing which 
constituted my person will be remaining?" 

Yolney, in his "Huins" says. " The soul is 
but the vital principle which results from the 
properties of matter, and from the action of the 
elements in these bodies, where they create a 
spontaneous movement. To suppose that this 
product of the play of the organs, born with 
them, matured with them, and which sleep with 
them, can subsist when they cease, is the ro- 
mance of a wandering imagination." 

When Abner Kneeland, in 1824, was half 
wav between Universalism and Infidelity, he 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 



59 



published a volume of lectures, in which he says, 
" Although the consequence of death would 
have been eternal had it not been for eternal 
life, yet the consequence would not have been 
eternal misery, but an eternal extinction of 
being : for death is an extinction of life." 

" It will be perceived that the author does not 
believe in an intermediate state of conscious 
existence between death and the resurrection, 
and of course death to him is an extinction of 
being, and all his ideas of a future state of exist- 
ence are predicated on the glorious doctrine of 
the resurrection." — P. 48. 

Mr. Balfour says, " No sacred writer mentions 
an immortal soul." "There is no immaterial, 
immortal soul which lives in a conscious state 
of happiness or misery in a disembodied con- 
dition." 

We see by these references that Annihila- 
tionists have taken up the dogma regarded as 
fundamental by these old enemies of Chris- 
tianity, and have adopted it as a primal doctrine 
of their creed, and exhibit a zeal in its propaga- 



60 ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 



tion far exceeding that of its hoary-headed and 
corrupt authors. We regret that our oppo- 
nents are found in such company, for we 
believe them, in this particular, to be far better 
than their creed would indicate. 

We notice, in closing our brief examination 
of this strange dogma, two objections urged by 
its advocates. The first we denominate 

Conditional Immortality. 

This may be regarded as the nucleus of the 
theory. The term "immortality" it is claimed, 
has the sense of simple existence^ and not a state 
or condition of existence. 

The argument is stated as follows : . 

1. God alone possesses immortality, (1 Tim. 
vi, 16,) meaning eternal existence. 

2. Man is required to seek immortality, 
(Rom. ii, 7,) meaning simple existence. 

3. It is claimed that immortality is the gift 
of Christ as Redeemer, and dependent on the 
resurrection. 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 61 



Let us examine these statements. The first 
fact stated is, that God only, or alone, hath im- 
mortality ; and, if possessed by man, it must be 
conferred by the grace of Christ. The immor- 
tality possessed by God only, at the time the 
apostle made this announcement, will, it seems, 
ultimately be possessed by all the saints, and 
then it will no longer be said, " God only hath 
immortality." But is it true, according to the 
views of Annihilationists that God was the 
only being in the universe at that time who 
possessed immortality? If we are not mis- 
taken, at the time Paul made this announce- 
ment, some, in their sense, were already pos- 
sessed of immortality. Enoch and Elijah, at 
least, were immortal in their sense ; so that God 
at that time was not the only being in the uni- 
verse who possessed immortality. 

The apostle's statement, " God only hath 
immortality," will remain true to all eternity. 
It is generally admitted that the term, as here 
employed, means an underived existence, in 
such a sense as no mere creature can or will 



62 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED, 



ever possess it, however earnestly lie seeks it. 
But when applied to man, it signifies that he is 
not liable to corruption or decay. With God it 
is underived / with man it is derived. The two 
immortalities differ widely. 

The term is employed also to describe the 
believer's crown — " incorriqjtiWe" It is ap- 
plied to the resurrection body — "raised in in- 
corriq;>tio7i." It is employed also to describe the 
believer's inheritance — " incorriqjtihle" And 
yet, " God only hath immortality." 

The second fact stated is, that man is re- 
quired to seek immortality, which would not 
be if all men possessed it. 

In the sense of " immortal inheritance " and 
" crown of life," immortality is conditional. But 
this is not simple existence, as Annihilationists 
claim, but ineffable happiness, which all men 
may accept or refuse. It is not immortality 
abstractly, but a blessed immortality. To illus- 
trate : there is a sense in which we are re- 
quired to seek the resurrection of the dead, 
(Phil, iii, 7-11,) and yet we are assured that 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 63 



all men — u the just and the unjust " — shall be 
raised. K" o one will claim that the resurrection, 
in the abstract, is to be sought, but simply a 
Messed resurrection, or " a better resurrection," 
as the Scriptures describe it. In like manner 
there is a sense in which immortality is to be 
sought ; and yet there is a sense in which all 
men will possess it. As mere existence, with- 
out reference to the character of that existence, 
immortality is possessed by all ; but as a blessed 
existence it is possessed only by those who seek 
it by faith in Christ. 

The third fact stated is, that immortality is 
the gift of Christ as Redeemer. 

That we owe our entire existence to Christ 
as Creator, will not be denied ; but that we owe 
our existence to him as Redeemer, is a pure 
assumption. It would be just as proper to say 
that our material bodies came by Christ as 
Redeemer, as to say that our immortal spirits 
came by him. Christ, as Redeemer, has but one 
work, that of saving sinners from their sins, and 
preparing them for a blissful immortality. 



64 ANNIHILATION" OF THE WICKED. 

The second objection we denominate 
The Death and Destruction Argument. 

That God has the power to blot from being 
all things and beings created by him, there can 
be no doubt ; but that he will do it, there is no 
evidence in the word of inspiration. 

1. The terms " life " and " death " are fre- 
quently employed by Annihilationists. "Life," 
with them, signifies simple existence, and 
" death" cessation or extinction of existence, or 
heing. " Death," being the penalty of the law, 
its infliction upon sinners is the blotting of them 
out of being. " Life," being the gift of God to 
believers in Christ, its bestowment is simply the 
gift of being. 

Now we deny that such is the exclusive mean- 
ing of these terms. Take the term " death." In 
some instances you cannot force extinction, or 
even suspension of vitality or existence, out of it. 
Jesus says : " Except a corn of wheat fall into 
the ground and die, it abideth alone ; but if it 
die, it bringeth forth much fruit." Paul says : 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 65 



" That which thou sowest is not quickened ex- 
cept it die." Here the term. death has its 
ordinary signification. But instead of the an- 
nihilation of being, its vitality is not even sus- 
pended ; for through the whole process of death 
the living germ retains its vital power un- 
harmed. The outer coat molders away, but 
the principle of life is still vital and active. If 
the corn can stand the infliction of this death 
penalty without a suspension of its vitality, may 
not the spiritual nature of man endure it with- 
out annihilation ? 

Lazarus died, and, instead of ceasing to be, he 
was carried into Abraham's bosom. The rich 
man died, and, instead of being annihilated, he 
is lifting up his eyes " in hell, being in torment." 
To say that " the wages of sin is death," is not 
saying that the wages of sin is annihilation. 
Death is used to express separation from holi- 
ness. " And you hath he quickened, who were 
dead in trespasses and sins." "Thou hast a 
name that thou livest and art dead." " For this 

my son was dead, and is alive again." Death 

5 



66 ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 

cannot, in these instances, mean extinction of 
conscious being, or annihilation. 

The use of the term " life 55 by Annihilation- 
ists is equally unscriptural. They never make 
any more out of it than simple being, while the 
Scriptures represent it as well being, or blessed- 
ness. When Joseph says, " God did send me 
before you to preserve life," nothing more is 
meant than simple being. But when Christ 
says, "If thou wilt enter into life, keep the 
commandments, 55 he means, not simple being, 
but the blessedness of salvation. 

When Jesus commands, " Take no thought 
for your life, 55 he is not to be understood as ex- 
horting them to take no thought for salvation. 
But when he says, " Te will not come unto 
me that ye might have life, 55 he does mean the 
blessedness of salvation. 

These Scriptures indicate the use of the term 
"life" And yet Annihilationists constantly 
employ this term to signify exclusively simple 
existence. 

2. Take the terms "destroy" and "perish" 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 67 



Annihilationists claim that these terms, applied 
to human beings, mean extinction of being, or 
annihilation. But if this be the meaning of 
these terms, then the Scriptures teach not only 
the extinction of the wicked, but of all men, 
good and bad. 

Job says, (xxxiv, 15,) " All flesh shall perish 
together." As the "flesh" or body, is all there 
is of man, if materialism be true, and as "all 
flesh " must mean all human beings, this text 
of necessity proves the utter extinction or anni- 
hilation of the whole race. And Job is care- 
ful to include the good in the list. He says, 
(ix, 22,) " He destroyeth the perfect and the 
wicked" This puts an end to the whole race. 
Materialists are not relieved by the resurrection 
of the just, for there can be no resurrection. 
God says of the Babylonians, (Jer. li, 39,) they 
shall " sleep a perpetual sleep, and not wake." 
David is bold, and says, (Psa. lxxxviii, 5,) " Free 
among the dead, like the slain that lie in the 
grave, whom thou rememberest no more." If this 
sleep is to be perpetual, if the sleepers are never 



68 ANNIHILATION" OF THE WICKED, 



" to wake," and are no more to be remembered, 
even by the Almighty, then there is no resur- 
rection, at least for sinners. But as no distinc- 
tion is made between saint and sinner, the saint 
will never awake ; for " he, 5 ' be he good or bad, 
" that goeth down to the grave shall come up 
no more." Job vii, 9. " I go whence I shall not 
return, even to the land of darkness and the 
shadow of death." Job x, 21. " Mine eye shall 
no more see good." Job vii, 7. 

We repeat, if the Babylonians were to sleep 
a perpetual sleep, and not wake ; if God was to 
remember the wicked no more ; if the dead 
were never to arise and praise God ; if those who 
went down to the grave were to come up no 
more ; if a very good man was never to return 
from the land of darkness, and no more to see 
good ; if the perfect and the wicked were to be 
alike destroyed, and all flesh were to perish to- 
gether — that is, according to Materialists, to be 
annihilated — what is the hope for the race ? 
Who is to be saved ? 

When Annihilationists ring their changes on 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 69 



" The dead know not any thing," and regard 
that as the end of all controversy with regard 
to the conscious state of the dead, they should 
not stop tli ere, but repeat the rest of the verse, 
" neither have they any more a reward." That 
would put an end to the whole matter, which 
would be perfectly satisfactory to every Deist 
and Atheist in the land ; for if by, " The dead 
know not any thing," is meant the unconscious 
state of the dead, then " neither have they any 
more a reward " must mean that they are never 
to be raised to life eternal. If there be any 
doubt as to the meaning of the text named, the 
following must settle it forever — " He that goeth 
down to the grave shall come up no more." 

It is very evident, from what has been said, 
that " destruction " and "perish" do not mean 
annihilation. Destroy is often used to signify 
simply physical death : " But the chief priests and 
elders persuaded the multitude that they should 
ask Barabbas, and destroy Jesus." Did they 
contemplate the annihilation of Jesus ? The 
Jews did not believe in annihilation. The word 



70 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 



destroy is frequently used to signify the ruin 
of a thing or person, and not their annihilation. 
"My people are destroyed for lack of knowl- 
edge." " He hath destroyed me on every side." 
" O Israel, thou hast destroyed thyself; but in 
me is thine help." 

There is no Scripture proof that the word 
"perish" ever signifies annihilation. It is 
sometimes used to express a violent death. 
" From the blood of Abel unto the blood of 
Zacharias, which perished between the altar and 
the temple." But its most common meaning is, 
the ruin of a thing or person : " And the bottles 
jperish" (Matt, ix, 17,) are ruined, but not an- 
nihilated. 

When Jeremiah predicted that the land of 
Judea should perish, and be burned up, (J er. ix, 
12,) he did not look to see it annihilated, but 
simply ruined. In this last sense the word is 
employed when used to express the penalty of 
sin ; it simply means that the sinner is ruined. 

Finally, the Scriptures are clear on the subject 
of the sinner's future state as being one of 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 



71 



banishment from the presence of God, united 
with conscious suffering, and both to continue 
forever. " O that men were wise," that they 
would consider this, and seek an immortality 
of glory, and escape indignation and wrath — not 
annihilation — which cometh " upon every soul 
of man that doeth evil ! " 



THE TWOFOLD NATURE OF MAN PSY- 
CHOLOGICALLY CONSIDERED. 



BY REV. W. R. CLARK, D.D. 



A CLASS of Biblicists deny the immateriality 
of the human soul. The facts of psychol- 
ogy, it is alleged, require a modification of the 
commonly received interpretation of the Bible 
upon this subject, as the facts of astronomy and 
geology have compelled other modifications of 
Scripture exegesis. A sensitive nerve is this, 
and touched by those who are even warmly at- 
tached to the Bible as their infallible guide. 
Their error may be detected by a little careful 
attention to the following points : 

1. Man's personal identity. This is one of 
his indestructible ideas, like those of personal 
existence, space, or duration. He can no more 
believe that he is not the same person to-day 



74 ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 

that he was yesterday or last year, than that he 
does not exist in space. 

Further, he is shut up to this conviction by 
the reductio ad dbsurdum. It is an established 
fact that the body is constantly changing by 
waste and supply, so that within a few months, 
or years at farthest, every particle of the former 
body passes away. If man is composed of 
nothiDg but a material body, then the totality 
of his former self passes away with this change ; 
he is a new creature in such a sense that his 
present self can no more be responsible for the 
acts of his former self than for the acts of any 
other being. 

Suppose him arraigned at court for a crime 
committed seven years ago ; he has only to ad- 
duce, the change of identity effected by the 
entire displacement of the particles composing 
the body which committed the crime to estab- 
lish an alibi. The jury must then either acquit 
him, or deny the physiological facts adduced, or 
assume his duality. 

Again, this hypothetical change of identity 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 75 

requires that marriage be resolemnized as often 
as the particles of the bodies which covenanted 
in the former ceremony are entirely displaced. 
And no parents can have lineal descendants 
over seven years of age; beyond that period 
the children bearing their names are theirs 
only by adoption, as might be any other " little 
wanderers." 

But a graver difficulty is that which involves 
the Divine administration in injustice in bring- 
ing man to an account for all the deeds done in 
the body, when the person so called to his ac- 
count can only be the author of the deeds done 
in quite the last period of the probation. 

There can be no escape from these absurdities 
by alleging that continuity and sameness in the 
form of the physical organization preserve the 
personal identity. The boy who bought the 
jack-knife, then lost the blades and had them 
replaced by new ones, then broke the handle 
and had it replaced, did not suppose he then 
possessed the knife first bought, because the 
size and style of it were preserved. A music- 



76 ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 



box is set running to the tune of " Sweet Home." 
Suppose that while the tune goes on there should 
be wrought in it, by some mysterious process, a 
displacement and replacement of particles pre- 
cisely similar to that which takes place in the 
human body, until all the original particles 
should have passed out of it : would it then be 
the original box, because the tune continues 
without variation \ Suppose all the eliminated 
particles to have dropped into a receptacle, and 
been reconstructed in a box giving forth the 
same tune: which now is the original box? 
To ask the question is to answer it. The iden- 
tity of the first box was not transferred to the 
second by continuity of tune or organization. 
Iseither can man's personal identity be trans- 
ferred to the new particles which displace the 
old ones in his body by continuity of thought 
and feeling, if they are evolved from the phys- 
ical organization like a tune from a musical 
instrument. 

2. Marts intuition of his own duality. All 
the great schools of philosphy have based their 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 77 

deduction upon intuitive cognitions, beliefs, and 
judgments of the mind; such as self-identity, 
causation, space, time, the infinite, the " me 
and the not me." These are seeds, roots, start- 
ing points of the mind, underived, independent, 
self-sufficient. " They rule the mind in its primi- 
tive energies of thought and belief." Argue, 
for instance, with an illiterate mind against the 
reality of an outward world ; contend that all his 
ideas of it are from his senses, and these, all being 
in the mind, he knows of nothing out of his 
mind — no outward world. He cannot find the 
flaw in the chain of your logic, but he will not 
be bound to your conclusions. He will still say, 
" There is an outward world." Is he candid % 
Ought he to give up his intuition of " the not 
me" for your conclusion, because he cannot 
break your logic? Common sense replies no; 
for he must still rely on intuitions of self, and 
causation for the authority of your logic; "and 
if in the first instance the intuition is not valid, 
how does it appear that it is in the second ? Any 
philosophy which, in its ultimate conclusions, 



78 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 



collides with these intuitive judgments, must go 
under as surely as the dory which collides with 
the steamer. As a means for. the discovery of 
truth, philosophy and logic are indispensable. 
So is engineering for the discovery of the gold 
places ; but when the precious metal is brought 
to the light, the rustic, as well as the engineer, 
can distinguish it from the dross. Doddridge, 
in writing his commentary, often appealed to 
the judgment of a humble woman in his parish, 
to test the accuracy of his exegesis. 

Ask the more illiterate man if he believes 
that what in him thinks, loves, hates, desires, 
resolves, is the same as his bones, and the earth 
on which he treads, and he will laugh you to 
scorn for seriously asking such a question. 
You might as easily convince him that he walks 
on his head, or flies through the air, as that the 
pulp of his brain thinks. 

So universal is this intuition that it has been 
one of the fixed data in all the schools from 
Anaxagoras to Hamilton, Epicureans and the 
Hobbesian wing of the Sensationalists alone 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 79 



excepted. With this inconsiderable exception, 
all the grand philosophies — the idealistic, the 
skeptical, the mystic, and the sensational — from 
509 years B. C. to the present, have alike 
ranked it among the indestructible convictions 
of mankind. A fact of mental science which 
has stood the test of such a crucible, can hardly 
be jeered at as "a sublime absurdity," without 
an impeachment of the intelligence of the ages, 
which is ludicrous from its weakness. 

3. The absurdity of assuming that the mere 
organization of matter should evolve attributes 
which it did not origincdly possess. Materialists 
admit that only certain forms of organized mat- 
ter can think and feel. The admission is fatal to 
their theory, involving it in the paradox of pro- 
ducing something from nothing. If they claim 
for matter organized, properties not inherent in 
matter unorganized, it devolves on them to 
show whence those properties. Escape from the 
dilemma has been sought in a fancied analogy 
of the watch. " There is no time," it is said, 
" in the materials of which the watch is made ; 



80 ANNIHILATION OF THE "WICKED. 

yet when organized, it will indicate the hour, 
minute, and second. 55 But in indicating; the 
hour, minute, and second, does it develop a new 
property^ or simply a function ? Were not the 
elasticity in the spring, the adhesion in the 
chain, the hardness in the pivots, the smooth- 
ness in the dial, and the color in the ink of the 
figures, before what were organized ? Is time in 
the watch in any other sense than that it per- 
forms certain mechanical functions from which 
inferences are drawn respecting the succession 
of " hours, minutes, and seconds i ' 5 To claim for 
matter organized in the watch any qualities it 
did not originally possess, is as palpably absurd 
as to claim for the granite of the milestones 
along the railroad new properties, because by 
them you count the miles you travel. 

To say that the Creator may have developed 
out of the human organism the attributes of 
mind, though the act of doing it is inconceiva- 
ble, is both to beg the question and aver an 
absurdity. 

If mind is evolved from matter by organiza- 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 



81 



tion, it is a phenomenon to be .shown by the 
analysis of mind and matter ; otherwise, all 
proof from that source fails. 

To assume that the Creator, because omnipo- 
tent, may have evolved mind from matter, is 
as contradictory as to suppose him to develop 
the rule of three from a rose-bud, make a 
triangle weigh a pound, or create two mountains 
without a valley between them. 

4. The testimony of consciousness. This is 
the source whence every fact in the philosophy 
of mind must be derived. Sir Win. Hamilton 
defines it to be " the recognition, by the think- 
ing subject, of its own acts or affections — the 
light which detects whatever comes into the 
mind." "It is the power by which mind is- 
aware of its own states and activities," says 
Prof. 0. S. Henry. "It is the sentinel which 
apprehends whatever comes into the mind," 
says Prof. H. Lummis, with equal pertinence 
and clearness. 

All the late and high authorities now agree 
in affirming consciousness to be coextensive with 



82 ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 



the percept ions. The mind is conscious of every 
object which it perceives, This is the ground 
of certainty in our knowledge. The veracity of 
consciousness cannot be denied without felo de 
se. If you deny its veracity, you are conscious 
of denying, and hence assume its veracity in the 
act of denying it. 

The testimony of consciousness to the duality 
of man is fourfold. 

(1.) It testifies to the antithesis of mind and 
matter as clearly as it does to the antithesis of 
a moral virtue and a triangle. If matter, in any 
of its forms, and mind are identical, they must 
be so in their qualities. Consciousness cognizes, 
for example, in mind the qualities of perception 
and passion ; in matter, resistance and exten- 
sion. If these qualities are identical, they are 
interchangeable ; and we may speak of the per- 
ception and passion of matter, and of the re- 
sistance and extension of mind. Let one con- 
verse in this way, and he would be thought a fit 
subject for the lunatic asylum. But if the es- 
sential qualities of mind and matter are anti- 



AXSTHILATIOX OF THE WICKED. 83 



thetical, their respective subjects are absolutely 
separate entities, 

(2.) Consciousness testifies to the presence of 
ideas in the mind which do not enter it through 
the senses. Ideas which strike the consciousness 
from the senses are all represented by the sen- 
sations, as the ideas of physical pain and pleas- 
ure. But how can ideas of the absolute, the 
infinite, space and duration, which are infinite 
in extent, be represented by sensations which 
are finite ? How can a tree cast the shadow 
of a mountain, or a rill echo the thunder of 
Xiagara ? 

Again, how can we conceive ideas of good 
and evil to be represented by the sensations ? 
" By regarding them as synonymous with pleas- 
ure and pain," said Hobbes ; and thus struck 
at the foundation of morals and religion. To 
recoil from such infidelity is to abandon the 
materialistic origin of religious ideas. 

If, then, there are ideas in the mind not 
derived from the senses, they must have had 
their origin in an entity distinct from the body. 



84 



AXXIHILATIOK" 



OF THE WICKED.. 



(3.) Consciousness testifies to being itself 
already in the mind when the sensations enter it* 
I strike my body, and a sensation is produced, 
I am conscious of it because I feel it ; if I did 
not feel it, there would be no sensation. There 
are, then, in this experience, three things : 
(a.) The sensation ; (5.) The cognition of it ; 
(c.) The subject which cognizes it. But the sensa- 
tion is not the consciousness, for it is the object 
of cognition. The cognition is not the conscious- 
ness any more than the act of seeing is the eye. 
The subject which cognizes, then, must be the 
consciousness. But the subject which, cognizes 
must be logically antecedent to the thing cog- 
nized. If, then, consciousness is logically ante- 
cedent to sensation, it does not originate in it, 
and is independent of it. 

(4.) Consciousness testifies to an original 
causative power in the mind, which cannot be 
predicated of the sensations. I am conscious of 
choosing, and of power not to choose — of will- 
ing, and of power not to will. Not so with the 
sensations, if I cut my hand, the sensation of 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 



85 



pain will continue, with no power to arrest it. 
I am conscious of feeling it, with the conscious- 
ness of not being able not to feel it. But when 
I act, it is with the consciousness of power not 
to act. 

These facts make the distinction between 
mind and the physical organization so broad 
and clear that it seems unnecessary to enlarge 
further upon it. 

5. The veracity of the Creator. He alone is 
responsible for the validity of every belief which 
arises necessarily in the mind. I cannot avoid 
the belief that I exist in space. If this belief is 
not valid, my existence is a cheat. I have, for 
instance, a conscience which necessitates belief 
in the reality of moral distinctions. If those 
distinctions are a chimera, then He who en- 
dowed me with the conscience whence that 
belief of necessity springs, is subjecting me to a 
life-long deception. In like manner does the 
veracity of God guarantee validity to the belief 
in the duality of man — an intuition of which 
the common mind cannot dispossess itself. 



86 ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 



That the intuitive nature of this belief has 
been denied does not invalidate the argument 
drawn from it, for this is true of all the other 
intuitions. Men have denied the existence of 
self, of the outer world, of the infinite, the ab- 
solute, space, duration, good and evil, causa- 
tion. At intervals, along the path of specula- 
tive thought, these periodic land-slides of 
scholastic rubbish have overslaughed the deeper 
life of the soul ; but its germinant forces have 
sprung up through and around them, like 
Alpine flowers amid the glaciers, attesting a 
deathless vitality despite the superincumbent 
congelations. These cheeks, if such they de- 
serve to be called, to the true philosophy, only 
show it the more clearly to be the very essence 
of human thinking, which, like Milton's angels, 

" Yital in every part, 
Cannot but by annihilation die." 

This argument has cumulative force from the 
assurance of the dying saint that he is about 
" to depart and be with Christ," and that " to 
die is gain." After discounting all that Mate- 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 87 

rialists can fairly claim as the result of what 
they allege to be false teachings upon this sub- 
ject, careful observation will discover in these 
experiences a large margin left for a spontaneity, 
springing, not from theoretical belief, but from 
the revelation (uncovering) of Christ in the 
soul. It is the bubbling up of a fountain 
within, having its natural outgushing in the 
sweet symphony of Rowland Hill, 

" This I do find, we two are so joined, 

He'll not live in glory, and leave me behind." 

Behind, in a myriad ages of unconsciousness !— 
behind, to be scattered to the winds with the 
dust of the poor body! Perish the thought! 
No such chasm can mar the symmetry of the 
Divine plan, whose crowning perfection should 
be the fruition of intuitional hopes, matured 
and intensified in proportion to the conformity 
of their subject to the spirit and precepts of 
that plan. To affirm such an absurdity is to 
cast a baleful shadow over the whole of experi- 
mental Christianity. 

6. The Phenomena of death. If the soul is a 



88 ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 



part of the body, is it not in the body at what 
is called death ? If so, is the body dead ? Ought 
it to be buried ? Is not the person only asleep, 
and as truly liable to awake as one who sleeps 
for the night ? If the soul is the result of organ- 
ization, it must continue in the body while the 
organization remains unimpaired. But at the 
instant of death no change occurs in the organi- 
zation of the body ; there is simply a cessation 
of its functions. Anatomical examination finds 
every part perfect as before the breath left the 
body. A live coal placed upon a stone parts 
with its caloric and changes its color, but not 
its organization. To assume a change of bodily 
organization because of the cessations of bodily 
functions, when physiological facts do not show 
it, is to beg the question. 

If the soul remains in the body at death, 
where is it in the case of the martyrs . whose 
bodies were burned and scattered to the four 
quarters of the globe ? If it is out of the body, 
is it not immaterial ? If it is neither in the 
body nor out of it, is it not" annihilated ? And, 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 89 



therefore, is it not a false use of words to talk 
of the sleep of the soul at death ? As well 
affirm the sleep of a soul before it begins to 
exist, as after it has ceased to exist. 

It is unnecessary to follow this line of thought 
further. The simple facts adduced, as clearly 
reveal a twofold nature in man as the steamer 
plowing the sea shows a joint force of propul- 
sion and resistance. 

The following objections are urged: 

1. JVo one has ever seen man otherwise than 
as a unit. That is, Xo one by his senses has 
seen an immaterial nature in man ; therefore he 
has none. Xo one by his senses has seen God, 
and is there therefore no God ? But it is not 
true that no one has, by his consciousness* seen 
— cogriized — man otherwise than as a unit. 

2. If there he a soul in man distinct from the 
body j define it. This is easily done. The soul 
is indivisible, imponderable ; it exists in time 
and space, and possesses conative, emotional, 
and cognitive powers. Can body be any more 
clearly defined than can soul ? 



90 A^sXIHILATIOX OF THE TRICKED. 



3. If no one has seen the soul, it is presump- 
tion to say that it exists. If " no man has seen 
God at any time," is it presumption to say that 
he exists ? 

4. If man has an immaterial soul, where did 
he get it ? If immediately from God. God is 
the immediate author of his innate depravity. 
If from the parent, the parentis soul is divisible. 

The soul comes from God in no other sense 
than does the body. Both are the result of 
God's established economy. If the depravity 
is alleged, the difficulty is not avoided by shift- 
ing depravity from the soul to the body, since 
both alike spring from an economy of which 
God is the author. 

But the presumption is, that the soul, with 
the body, proceeds from the parent. The only 
objection urged against this is, that it is a con- 
tradiction, since the soul is defined to be in- 
divisible. Tet is not God indivisible ? And is 
it, therefore, a contradiction to say that our first 
parents came immediately from him ? 

If a single instance can be adduced of the 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 91 

creation of an entity by a soul, then the con- 
tradiction charged upon the presumption that 
the soul creates, without dividing itself, van- 
ishes. Now if I throw a ball, it will go on 
forever, if it meet with no resistance. Why? 
Because it possesses a certain quantum of force 
which I have imparted to it. Yet my force is 
not diminished by what I have imparted to the 
ball. Have I not, then, created an entity with- 
out dividing myself? But if I have created one 
entity without dividing myself, I may another, 
for aught that appears in the nature of the 
case. Thus does this alleged contradiction 
vanish like a bubble at the touch, leaving the 
presumption in favor of the procreation of the 
soul. Where is there proof to the contrary? 

5. If the soid is immaterial, it ought to re- 
member when it became united with the body. 
For a reason just as conclusive, it ought, if 
material, to remember when it was dislodged 
from the body of the parent. Has it such a 
recollection ? 

6. If the soul is immaterial, it shotdd be logi- 



92 ANNIHILATION" OF THE WICKED. 



cally conscious of its existence prior to its union 
with the body. For a similar reason, if the 
soul is material, it should be conscious of its 
existence at the moment of procreation. It is 
as easy to affirm the latter as the former. 

7. If the soul is immaterial, it should know 
its own existence without being apprised of it 
by the senses. Certainly ; and this is just what 
it does know. It is only by first knowing its 
own existence that it can know that it has 
sensations. It knows it has physical pleasure 
and pain because it feels them ; and knows it 
feels them because there is a subject which 
feels, and which is not the feelings or sensations 
themselves. Chronologically, the conscious- 
ness may be coetaneous with the sensations; 
but logically, it must ever be antecedent to 
them. 

8. If consciousness be the fruit of the senses, 
how can it be shown to be an attribute of an im- 
material entity ? If by this is meant that the 
senses are the cause of consciousness, the affir- 
mation is denied. As already shown, conscious- 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 93 



ness is in the mind antecedent to the sensations. 
If it is simply meant that the senses occasion 
the acts of consciousness, there is no more diffi- 
culty in the case than that these objections 
should occasion my attempt to answer them. 

9. If the soul cognizes its existence only 
through the senses, how can its existence as a 
separate entity he affirmed? It is not true that 
the soul cognizes its existence only through the 
senses. " It starts with a knowledge of itself/' 
says Sir Wm. Hamilton. The sensations are an 
occasion of its development : but it is aware of 
its own existence antecedent to the sensations, 
otherwise their presence could not be perceived. 
If perceived, there must -be aperceiver, and the 
perceiving must be logically antecedent to the 
thing perceived. 

10. If the soul does not depend upon organ- 
ized matter for its attributes, why should it 
ever be unconscious of its own being ? If the 
soul does depend upon organized matter for its 
attributes, why should it ever lose self-conscious- 
ness in sleep, so long as the organization re- 



94 ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 



mains unchanged? The latter case is just as 
inexplicable as the former. But if it is intended 
to affirm that the suspension of the senses causes 
a suspension of the consciousness, the affirmation 
is denied, and the burden of proof falls upon 
him who makes it. 

The consciousness of self may be diverted. 
The boy chasing the butterfly is not for the 
moment conscious of himself ; but his conscious- 
ness is not therefore suspended, it is only di- 
rected to another object. The martyrs were 
enwrapped in such a blaze of glory as not to be 
conscious of the crisping of their flesh at the 
stake, but it was because they were conscious 
of something else. 

The evidence is strong that the consciousness 
is never suspended. If it is, how could a sen- 
sation ever arouse it ? I strike my hand — no 
sensation is produced unless I feel it ; but if I 
feel it, there is something in me antecedently 
awake which feels, otherwise the impact would 
not be a sensation. 

We recall many of the mental activities of a 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 95 



state of sleep. Is not the presumption strong 
that if the memory were perfect, activities fill- 
ing every moment of sleep would be recalled ? 
To infer that there were none except such as 
are recalled is as absurd as to infer that there 
were no activities in one's boyhood except such 
as he can recall. 

A person goes to sleep charging himself to 
wake at a given hour, and wakes when the 
hour arrives. Does not his consciousness retain 
the charge committed to it ? The faithful nurse 
sleeps so soundly that the rattle of the wheels 
upon the pavement does not disturb her, but 
the first rustle of the patient brings her instant- 
ly to her feet. Does not her consciousness watch 
the patient ? A ball struck the head of an 
officer in the Crimea when giving a command, 
and left him in a state of insensibility. On re- 
covering from it, his first mental act was to 
finish giving the command. Did not his con- 
sciousness retain the thought during the interval 
of physical insensibility ? 

"With these strong facts supporting the con- 



96 ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 



tinuity of consciousness, its suspension should 
not be assumed, as in this objection, without 
proof. 

11. The argument for the twofold nature of 
man, based on the alleged antithesis of mind 
and matter, proves the twofold nature of beasts. 
Admitted. What then? They may or may 
not be immortal. That they have a degree of 
intelligence no one will deny. 

12. A second childhood obtains in old age. 
If this is because the mind is material, and 
comes under the same law of decay which is 
inherent in the body, then its imbecility ought 
invariably to commence at the period when the 
waste of the body exceeds the supply, at the age 
of forty or fifty years. If a single exception to 
this can be adduced, it is sufficient to show 
that mind is not under the control of physical 
law, as is the body, and consequently is not a 
part of the body. 

If a single instance could be adduced in 
which a feather does not obey the law of gravi- 
tation, it would break the universality of that 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 



97 



law, and reverse the whole theory of the cosmos. 
But not only is there one instance in which the 
vigor of the mind is not affected by the decay 
of the body; the instances are so universal that 
their converse is the rare exception. The great- 
est intellectual vigor of which history boasts 
has been developed after the body had become 
decrepit with age and disease. This no one 
will deny ; and it at once and forever en- 
thrones mind over physical law, and establishes 
its immortality. 

It must be obvious that the materialism 
which just now clamors for the sanctions of the 
Bible and the honor of the Christian name, logic- 
ally strikes at the foundation of all morals and 
religion. If the soul is material it must be ab- 
solutely under the control of physical law, and 
be incapable of obedience to any other. There 
can be no exception to this more than there" can 
be to the fact that water seeks an equilibrium, 
or that a stone drops to the earth. A material 
substance must as inevitably remain subject to 
material law as a galley-slave to the motions of 



98 ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 



the boat to which he is chained. To allege that 
mind, as apart of the body, can obey moral law, 
is as unthinkable as that a body can occupy 
two points in space at the same time. Thus rea- 
soned Hobbes from premises furnished him by 
the sensational philosophy, and with a logical 
consistency which sent a tremor throughout 
Christendom proclaimed virtue and vice to be 
mere figures of speech. 

Again, if all our ideas are derived from the 
sensations, by what means can we have any idea 
of that which is not material ? This is the ques- 
tion which Hume asked in vain to have Locke 
answer from his premises. Hume accepted the 
logical consequences of his master's teachings, 
and plunged into the maelstrom of religious 
skepticism. Locke heard the roar of the vor- 
tex, gave up philosophy, and threw himself upon 
Revelation, which was his only surety for any 
thing beyond the material world ; his moral con- 
sistency overmatched his philosophy and res- 
cued him. Hobbes and Hume only followed out 
with irrefragable logic the sequences of premises 



ANNIHILATION OF THE WICKED. 99 



which the Materialists of the present time are 
again seeking to consecrate at the shrine of re- 
ligion. Let them be met at the threshold with 
the facts of a second Psychology. 

" Hold thou the good ; define it well, 
For fear divine Philosophy 
Should push beyond her mark, and bo 
Procuress to the lords of hell." 



THE END. 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS * 

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II II I II I II 



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